Here’s me bearing the gift at the Impressionist exhibit at the de Young Museum on her birthday (which was great!) and here it is the next day hanging at her desk at work.

“This month’s winner in the Conceptualization category was a no-brainer: Bradenton, Florida’s very own Have Gun, Will Travel. Their handsome sophomore effort, Postcards From The Friendly City (Suburban Home) is almost as notable for its ingenious design and packaging as its organic, infectious brand of Americana pop. We here at UTR are big fans of bands that claim their hometowns with pride and, like the finest local produce, HGWT’s music has a refreshing immediacy to it that can only come from an innate connection with one’s native environment. Like a Sunshine State-sanctioned answer to New York’s Fountains of Wayne, the band expertly canonizes the displacement of suburban existence on such gems as “Land Of The Living” (We belong to the land of the living/ but we don’t live there anymore) and conjures up a disturbingly cheery dystopia in “Maritime Rag” and the aching “Salad Days.” And, really, in these days of managed expectations and digital-only releases, not enough can be said about the great lyric insert in the album package, cleverly reproduced to look like a folded miniature copy of the Bradenton Chronicle from 1955. Excellent work, fellows.”

Source: www.americansongwriter.com

Made with Gawker.

You guys remember that screamo band, Grade (like, circa ’99)? I think your friend Matt was into them. Anyway, if you don’t know Grade, don’t bother, but this one came on iTunes while I was emo-painting and I was taken back to high school. YEAH MAN, LIKE, I SO IDENTIFY TO THAT.

“This is a time in my life where everything is falling apart,
and at the same time it’s all coming together.”
— Grade; A Year in the Past, Forever in the Future

For Virna.

And here’s a video I saw today from Knife Party that’s good in visuals and in theory:

Coalition Of The Willing from coalitionfilm on Vimeo.

http://coalitionofthewilling.org.uk/

…And I don’t know about the “bikability” of FREE ENERGY, but spawned from the ashes of one of my favorite groups, Hockey ♥ Night, it’s worth mentioning that I can’t stop listening to their debut album, “Stuck on Nothing.”

Hockey Night slumber party, 5/11/06. Boston.

My mother is one of the most talented artists I’ve ever known. When I was 7 or 8, she set me up in the basement and gave me a lesson in watercolor painting. As an Emmet Kelly collector and admirer, the subject she chose for my first painting was a hobo clown. It is still proudly on display in an overstated frame in the house I grew up in.

So did you guys hear about the stunt Fat Mike from NOFX pulled at this year’s SXSW? He played an acoustic show as this character called Cokie the Clown. If you want to peep this super controversial set, there is a video below. It’s more than a half hour investment, but if you happen to be a fan, it’s worth it. Spoiler alert: The prize at the end is where he reveals to the audience that they had taken shots of Patron cut with his urine.

Since my NOFX obsession hasn’t really subsided since I was 14, I was inspired to do a hobo clown painting V.2 which I then went ahead and made into a poster for a fun design exercise.

Here’s the show that inspired this painting:

(Thanks Ricky / theinternettoday.net for providing this video!!)